


something more,

by Nerd_of_Camelot



Series: given time, [3]
Category: Jak and Daxter
Genre: Daxter is a Good Friend, Feelings, Friendship, Gen, Hugs, Jak has Dissociative Amnesia, Jak is Bad at Feelings, Loyalty, Male Friendship, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Trauma, can be read as romantic if you wanna
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:47:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24832600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nerd_of_Camelot/pseuds/Nerd_of_Camelot
Summary: Daxter made Jak feel things - better than anyone else could make him feel anything.And he was unflinchingly loyal to Daxter, and Daxter gave that loyalty back point for point.And Jak was selfish.
Relationships: Daxter & Jak
Series: given time, [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1795468
Comments: 2
Kudos: 27





	something more,

The sparking, hot feeling he got sometimes when Daxter made a joke was coming more often these days.

And there was another thing that cropped up just at random when he was around Daxter. Another sort of weird feeling in his chest that he recognized but  _ didn’t _ in any way that made it identifiable. Just knew he’d felt it before. Maybe frequently.

The longer he sat with his empty chest and things spiralled into some sort of semblance of  _ calm, _ he started to feel things more often. Didn’t remember any more than he usually did, but almost sort of started being able to predict his reactions to things that wouldn’t be anger or sadistic glee. He felt like he was rotting fairly often as well but the emptiness seemed more common and it was fading off into something else.

Less of a feeling like something was missing from his chest and more of a feeling like there was something  _ there _ and he couldn’t find it. Like he was just barely missing it when he went reaching.

Like knowing the light switch was  _ there _ but still having to pat around for it in the dark.

He guessed, with the threat of Kor and the Dark Makers and Praxis and Errol and every other monster beside himself that he was aware of no longer hanging overhead at all times, he was just finally in a position where he could process. Where the Light Eco could actually turn the emptiness back into something. Could actually balance not just his internal Eco levels and his powers, but  _ him. _

Like, in  _ general. _

He knew it must be working when he started feeling  _ hope _ that it would happen.

Not just idle wonderings he  _ called _ hope when he knew they were just empty wishful thoughts, but real  _ hope. _ Something real and true and, yeah, sort of sludgy and sticky right now where it mixed with the rot, but  _ genuine. _

Something other than empty or rotting or angry or sadistic.

Something…  _ Good. _

He knew Daxter noticed. He knew the  _ others _ noticed. Saw the way he was able to start responding with something other than outright anger when something did happen to not go his way. Saw how he started being able to consider things for a moment and actually come up with solutions that weren’t “blow it to bits and laugh the whole time”.

And he noticed, which was the most important part.

And the more he felt that sparking heat and other weird brief-but-too-real feeling in his chest while he was around Daxter, the more he wanted to be around the little fuzzy rudeass.

Daxter was his best friend and always had been―that wasn’t a question. He was unflinchingly loyal to Dax and Dax, in spite of his general lack of any social grace brought on by years of being rude back to everyone who was rude to him, gave that unflinching loyalty right back to him without batting an eyelash. They were a pair. The Demolition Duo. Saviors of Haven and Warriors of Spargus and all that lovely, lovely jazz. They stuck together.

But with everything settled, he’d spent most of his time sitting in a corner booth in the Naughty Ottsel and thinking. Not sticking right on top of Daxter. And Daxter ran the bar and didn’t stay right on top of him. They gave each other distance and as nice as it was, well…

Jak wouldn’t ever pretend that he wasn’t selfish.

That he didn’t get jealous when Daxter paid too much attention to someone else.

When he wasn’t at least  _ next _ to Daxter while he paid too much attention to someone else.

He was always the number one for Dax and he knew that―his best friend and his oldest friend and the one who would always put up with him even if he was being more annoying than any sane person would bother trying to handle. If he was within range of the guy he knew that Dax wouldn’t forget about him even if he was giving him space.

But his brain was stupid, he guessed.

Not the point―with those feelings popping up more often and almost always because of Daxter, Jak didn’t bother continuing to try and give him space.

Because he was selfish.

And he wanted Daxter around, and he wanted to feel those things since it seemed like Daxter was the best at making them pop up.

He’d taken to sitting at the bar again, like he’d been doing right after things started settling down. And with him at the bar, Daxter spent most of his time between flirting with customers talking Jak’s ear off like it was the good old days.

And that, at least, felt familiar and good.

And that weird, unidentifiable feeling popped back up every time.

Jak tried so hard to figure out what it was, but to say he wasn’t having much luck would be an understatement. He just didn’t have a good enough understanding of anything but emptiness and anger and rot and sadism to be able to pick out what this feeling was. Especially since it didn’t have a sparking, hot feeling or another almost physical sensation with it.

Not like everything else.

Empty felt cavernous and dark. Rot felt sludgy and like if he were to open himself up, everything would just come tumbling out in a black  _ blob. _ Anger was hot, burning at the rotting and using it as rather explosive kindling until either the rot rolled and extinguished it or the rot bubbled and it actually exploded. Sadism was cold, and felt a lot like being empty except that it ate away at whatever the rot left behind. The sparking, hot feeling felt just like that―like it was sparking against where his heart should be, spreading heat through his abdomen, but not feeding off the rot like anger did.

And speaking of the sparking, hot feeling…

“Listen, bud,” Daxter was saying, tone flat and face unimpressed, “Ya ain’t got the cash? Ya don’t get a drink.  _ Honestly. _ I don’t even wear  _ pants _ an’ I carry around more cash than you do! Your tab’s in the triple-digits.”

It wasn’t a joke. He was telling the guy off and Jak recognized him as someone who always charged to his tab―which would explain the commentary form Daxter. But somehow the comment about not wearing pants and still carrying more cash than him made that feeling bubble up through the hollowness.

… Was it amusement, he wondered?

Fondness?

He wasn’t sure.

Still, when the guy inevitably started cursing up a storm, Jack snorted and calmly unholstered his gun, letting the barrel tap against the bar next to him.

The guy went quiet, and left with a surprising amount of grace for someone who had probably just pissed himself.

Daxter laughed. Jak found himself almost smiling as he put his gun back where it belonged. And that feeling burned through him.

“Dumbass,” The little fuzzball snickered, waltzing back across the bar to Jak, “I should pay ya for how often ya gotta do that, honestly. May as well be the bouncer.”

Jak’s lips pulled, at last, into a smile, and he chuckled.

He didn’t think he’d managed that, didn’t  _ remember _ doing it, since before Haven. Not in a way that wasn’t linked directly to sadism. And it felt freeing, really, to do it. It made the hollowness and the rotting feeling go away for a second.

But Daxter stopped, blinked at him. The feeling of free turned into something that made his heart stutter.

Was it really that surprising for him to laugh, he wondered, and then called himself an idiot because of  _ course _ it was. He’d been in Haven four years, back at Daxter’s side for two, and to date he only remembered laughing or smiling in that time when it was because he was killing something or blowing something up.

He felt his smile waver a bit, and Daxter blinked again and  _ grinned. _

“Ha!” He said, oddly triumphant and looking very pleased with himself, “I  _ knew _ ya could still laugh!”

“Idiot.” He said, in return, but he felt his smile solidify back into a grin as he reached out to carefully knock Daxter over onto the surface of the bar, snickering at the immediate affronted noise and lack of any attempt to get back up.

He scratched under the fuzzball’s chin and watched him melt, and felt that sparking, hot feeling and the weird unidentifiable one at the same time.

And he realized, suddenly―the sparking, hot feeling?

It was  _ happiness. _

The weird one?

_ Fondness. _

And he wasn’t sure if it was the feelings that made him smile, or the fact that he finally knew what they were again.

But he was smiling for the rest of the day anyway, and when he and Daxter went up to their apartment above the bar after they closed down for the night, he swept the little rat up into his arms and held him. And Daxter laughed, wrapping his little arms around his neck and snuggling close.

And Jak felt so fond he thought he might just keel over.

**Author's Note:**

> words for this one were selfish/hug
> 
> probably gonna be using words to prompt all of these and there's going to be a _few_ , i have decided
> 
> if nothing else it's something for me to write when i can't seem to work on anything else lol


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